Microsoft, Google working on super cookies to track your activity on every device

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It has served us well for almost 20 years, but now the humble browser cookie is on its deathbed, faced with forced obsolescence by a new brand of super cookies. Developed by the likes of Microsoft and Google, super cookies will track you wherever you go, and whatever you do, whether it’s on your smartphone, PC, game console, or even TV.

The HTTP cookie began life as a simple way of storing your preferences for a website, but quickly became the primary way of providing targeted advertising. For the most part, targeted ads are the sole reason that most of the web is free to surf, and thus why cookies are so damn important. As internet access has spread to mobile devices, TVs, and game consoles, though, surfing habits have changed, and the cookie has been unable to keep up. There have been various attempts to rejuvenate cookies for the 21st century, but for various reasons they’ve never really worked out. Furthermore, with the recent Do Not Track movement, and some browsers looking at disabling third-party (tracking) cookies by default, the age of cookies is quickly drawing to a close.

Without a way of tracking our usage across devices, it’s very hard to derive behavioral patterns (analytics) or provide targeted advertising — and, put simply, it’s untenable for a commercial entity to be competitive without analytics or revenue stream. Thus, Google and Microsoft had announced their intentions to create new super cookies that can track us across every internet-connected device, and we wouldn’t be surprised if other giants such as Facebook and Apple aren’t also working on their own super cookies. While exact details of their implementations are pretty vague at this point, it’s presumed that these super cookies will probably link the unique identifiers (serial numbers) of your devices to some kind of global account, such as your Microsoft or Google account. The working name of the Google super cookie is AdID, but Microsoft’s cookie doesn’t have a name yet.

Once the unique ID of your smartphone, laptop, TV, and game console has been linked to a central point, it becomes very easy to track your usage behavior. Microsoft (or Google or Apple or Facebook) will know what time of day you wake up (when you first check your phone), the route you take to work (via GPS), where you work (GPS), your job description (via your searches), and when you get home, the games you play and TV you watch. (See: The Big Brother TV that watches you.)

If all this sounds rather terrifying to you, good. It’s already pretty scary that Google and Facebook have almost complete vision of your web surfing habits — to think that they could soon be privy to virtually all of your digital-oriented behavior (which is essentially your entire life, if you walk around with a smartphone in your pocket) is frankly disturbing.

There are two saving graces, though. Following a few cases of high-profile abuses of tracking cookies, and then US government intervention with the Do Not Track scheme, the online community is now quite savvy when it comes to being tracked. For years, many of us didn’t even realize that we were being tracked — and now, surfers actively seek out ways of blocking third-party tracking cookies, and using sites that comply with Do Not Track. In short, while these super cookies are scary, there will almost certainly be an easy way to turn them off — as enlightened denizens of the web, we simply won’t stand for anything else. We should also be somewhat comforted by the fact that all of our analytics are being stored on the servers of big, mostly trustworthy companies. As it stands, anyone can track you across the internet — if Microsoft and other tech giants implement super cookies, it’s highly likely that there will be a lot of safeguards to prevent your data falling into the wrong hands.

Even so, though, having these super cookies stored in a central repository will make for a very, very tempting target for hackers. Let’s not forget that most of these companies also have our credit card, contact, and address details, too. The last few years have shown that even huge companies like Sony and Vodafone and banks like Chase and Citigroup can’t secure their systems against hackers. If the likes of Microsoft and Google are going to store virtually our entire activity and behavior in a database somewhere, then it better be damn secure.

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Jamie MacDonald

” As it stands, anyone can track you across the internet — if Microsoft and other tech giants implement super cookies, it’s highly likely that there will be a lot of safeguards to prevent your data falling into the wrong hands.”

The same way putting an age limit on knives has stopped stabbings?

I always have my 3G turned off except when I need a quick browse. For battery and data usage reasons, mostly, but now there’s this reason as well.

Targeted advertising is a nice idea, so long as the end consumer actually wants to be targeted.

http://www.mrseb.co.uk/ Sebastian Anthony

There have been some cases of storing your location while you move around, and then uploading it when you connect to WiFi — so turning off 3G might not be much help :)

But yeah, as long as people have a choice, I think it’s OK. Having centralised data stores, while horrendously dangerous, are kind of a given with our current usage/behavior.

Sipho Mfungi

“big, mostly trustworthy companies” … are you kidding me!

disqus_IhJV09hhA1

“For the most part, targeted ads are the sole reason that most of the web is free to surf”

For the most part it’s the sole reason? For the most part, this is completely a weirdly worded opinion disguised as fact. But I agree and am not scared about this development. I think portraying them as tracking everything you do and calling them super cookies is a bit of a PR problem.

XenoSilvano

ExtremeTech is by far the most flagrant user of tracking elements, the amount of trackers tracking you on ExtremeTech is unlike anything I have ever seen on any other site:

I like that you used panties in that image of a supercookie. Didn’t have any briefs laying around?

Techutante

Hehe, I can’t even read this, the picture was too amusing.

James Tolson

oh god no!!!

time to cancel my internet ISP will be soon at hand, downgrade my smartphone to a feature phone, an not buy any electronic devise with a microsoft or apple or google operating system on it EVER!!!

i hope everyone will follow my lead :-)

Xellion

will i be compensated for my data?

Xylashe2039

My Uncle Jace just got a fantastic yellow Porsche Cayman by working part time off of a pc online. my site CAFE65.ℂℴM

http://slrman.wordpress.com/ James Smith

This is only one more, improved, opportunity for the government to intrude and record every aspect of our lives.

It isn’t as if any rational person still believes the USA is a free country. Think about it. No-warrant wire taps, indefinite detention of citizens without charges, approval of rendition of prisoners and torture, stop and frisk without probable cause, search and seizure without a warrant, no-knock entry, confiscation and destruction of cameras that might have been used to film police acting illegally, police brutality, police shootings that go without investigation, managed news, and the civil-rights destroying “Patriot” Act.

Acts of police behaving illegally, with shootings, Tasers, and unwarranted violence now appear almost daily. Rarely are these offenses punished. Most often “an investigation” is claimed, but soon forgotten.

In addition, the USA, with 5% of the world population, has 25% of all of the prisoners in the world. That means the USA has the most people in prison of any nation in history. Even by percentage of residents incarcerated, not just sheer numbers. USA is # 1! Does any of that sound like a free country?

As Dwight D. Eisenhower said about communism, “It’s like slicing sausage. First they out off a small slice. That isn’t worth fighting over. Then they take another small slice that isn’t worth fighting over. Then another and another. Finally, all you have left is the string and that isn’t worth fighting over, either.

Michael Scoffield

Amen brother ! You said exactly what I wanted to say. I agree entirely. I love America but it’s sad to see what it has transformed into.

http://slrman.wordpress.com/ James Smith

I loved America, too. But it’s hard to love what it’s becoming. I’m sure the Russians and the Germans loved their countries, too. But they still had Stalin and Hitler.

zapper

The new Soviet Union
A.K.A USA wants to rule the world
in order to vacuum suck all their resources
especially of developing countries
and sell them arms
so that they fight with each other
and remain weak & dependent on the first world
at the same time profit from defense industry.
Remember, the entire Internet is the Trojan Horse
A set up by US defense agencies.

Superman, Spiderman, Ironman looks like USA is the only man in the world
and all others are ladies.
;-)

Sean Davis

If Microsoft and Google are storing the data then it has already fallen into the wrong hands. They have already conclusively demonstrated that the government has merely to say “Jump!” and their immediate response is “How high?” May as well just shove an electronic leash up our collective backside.

http://www.abicana.com/shop2.htm Knut Holt

And in the background stands NSA and similar bodies sucking in any information picked up and from there it goes to any authority that may be interested in them.

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